Relevant academic literature in the field of marketing and business points to the importance of marketing among modern leading companies. Successful businesses that have good business results and competitive advantage in the global market rely on a marketing-oriented business, but small and medium-sized companies which don't possess financial strength to compete with a larger market competitors need to use a variety of available methods in the marketing segment to compete with large companies on the market, and thus capture the desired market segments. The research part of the graduate thesis therefore analyzes how companies use marketing and marketing concepts with an emphasis on internet marketing and how well they are aware of the importance of marketing oriented business. The research part of graduate thesis inspected 51 small and medium companies in the Republic of Croatia and covered various industries. The results indicate that companies perceive important segments such as creating content for potential buyers, communicating, and seeking feedback from end-customers. The same respondents usually use the basic features of internet marketing such as developing company's web site and conducting email marketing. However, most companies invest only 20% of marketing budgets in online marketing, concluding that there is a need to raise awareness of the importance of online marketing in modern business. Companies must certainly think about how to create a culture of holistic marketing in business so that existing and future employees can be better prepared for business purposes because Croatian education system isn’t up to date with the technological development of the private business sector and is unable to properly prepare future talents for marketing in such companies.